The Momentum That Never Came: A Chronology of UN Security Council Debates, 1993-2012

Osaka University

Title The Momentum That Never Came : A Chronology of UNSecurity Council Reform Debates, 1993-2012

Author(s) SILVA, Marina Magalhães Barreto Leite da

Citation 国際公共政策研究. 18(2) P.33-P.48

Issue Date 2014-03

Text Version publisher

URL http://hdl.handle.net/11094/51326

DOI

Rights

33

＊ PhD Candidate, Osaka School of International Public Policy, Osaka University.

国際公共政策研究　第18巻第 2 号寄稿論文 ③

The Momentum That Never Came:A Chronology of UN Security Council Reform Debates, 1993-2012

Marina Magalhães Barreto Leite da SILVA＊

Abstract

Using a chronological analysis combined with a support measuring system, this paper demonstrates how

the so-called points of momentum of the UN Security Council reform process aiming at enlarging the

Council never really happened. The chronology of facts and the percentages of support for proposals

reached during the 20 years of offi cial debates (1993-2012) prove that there were no real opportunities for

reform and, the so-called points of momentum were only impressions. The clear results presented by the

analysis, this work concluded that the reform never had a real momentum because the low levels of

support reached on specifi c topics would never make an enlargement possible, given the clear requirement

for a two-thirds majority in favor of reform among UN membership.

Keywords : Security Council, Reform, Debate, Chronology, Support, Enlargement, Agreement,

Momentum

国際公共政策研究第18巻第 2号34

1 – Introduction

During its 67 years of existence, the Security Council had procedural ups and downs inside the system of

United Nations (UN). Since the creation of the international organization, the history of the Council has been

comprised of activities, critics, and attempts to change its composition and methods. The power exercised by

the Security Council in the UN represents so much of the interests of member states that its functions and

composition were never laid aside of annual open debates into the General Assembly’s Hall.

The “Question of equitable representation on and increase in the membership of the Security Council and

related matters” was established in 1992 as an agenda item and started an offi cial process of debates on the

reform of the Security Council. These debates were open to all UN members and, as soon as it began,

established in 1993 an Open-ended Working Group to discuss and find solutions to the crisis of

representativeness related to the Council. Since then, the debates on these questions were the main stage for

the presentation of all different opinions and proposals towards the reform by representatives of the UN

membership.

Analyzing the reform debates over the last two decades and covering the academic perspectives on how the

process is being developed, it is easy to question how it was possible for these debates to last for so many

years. The official opened debates completed 20 years in spite of the points of momentum alleged by

representatives and researchers. According to the specialists, these points of momentum, were specific

situations inside the discussions when the reform almost came to a resolution. These apparent agreements

happened four times: First with the presentation of the Razali’s Plan in 1997; a second time with the

Millennium Summit in 2000; the third was in 2005 with the report In a larger freedom by Kofi Annan; and,

fi nally, when the Intergovernmental Negotiations were implemented in 2009.

Therefore, how real were these points of momentum for the expansion of seats, when matters of changing the

Council configuration were never even taken into consideration for voting processes? How close was an

agreement, if ideas did not receive the necessary support? This paper intends to establish a brief chronological

analysis of the debates on reforming the UN Security Council, aiming to demonstrate, through a numerical

system of measuring, how the so-called points of momentum of the reform process never really happened and

how the multipolarity of UN, as an international organization, is a bad characteristic when it comes to

benefi ciate the organization per se.

The analysis in this paper will combine chronological and numerical data to approach the case, in a sum of

quantitative and qualitative methods; presenting in the two fi rst sections of this paper a background and a

chronology of facts from the debates on the question of equitable representation inside the Security Council,

and, the third part, concentrates on the analysis of numerical data generated from the registers of these

debates.

35The Momentum That Never Came

2 – Background (1946-1992)

The creation based on the traumatic experience of the League of Nations granted to the UN Security Council

an entire existence of contestation, not just about actions towards the maintenance of peace and security, but

especially about its representative character for the whole membership of the organization. Although the

practices of the League of Nations had failed to achieve its objectives, the structure of its system was utilized

as the bottom line to build the UN system and represented a lesson of how founders should deal with this new

organization aiming its success. The League was the basis of the creation of everything we see currently as

UN, specially the Security Council. (Hanhimäki, 2008, 17)

By following the determinations of the UN Charter, which was largely based on the model of the former

League, the Security Council started to work in January of 1946. The initial composition was of 5 permanent

members – United States (US), United Kingdom (UK), China, France and Soviet Union (USSR) – and 6 non-

permanent members – elected by the General Assembly for a two-year term and without the possibility of

immediate reelection after these years.

Council members established matters of working methods internally, following instructions of Article 30 of

the fi fth chapter. Questions of seats distribution, format of meetings and elections of presidents, for example,

were determined inside the Council’s chamber. These methods took the initial distribution of non-permanent

seats to a frame that became known as the “Gentleman’s Agreement.” “The membership of the Security

Council in its early years was a refl ection of the principal elements of power in the UN on the one hand and

the major regional groups of states on the other.” (Bourantonis 2005, 13) According to this informal

agreement among the 5 permanent members, non-permanent representation inside the Council should be

regionally divided among Latin America, Middle East, Western and Eastern Europe and the British

Commonwealth.

This initial model of distribution just worked perfectly for UN membership during 5 years. Even though,

during these years some regions were not contemplated at all for participation at the Council. The African and

the Asian continents, for example, did not receive fostering from the permanent 5 during non-permanent seats’

elections and had no opportunities to act prominently inside UN until the ‘60s. As Simon Chesterman

affirmed, “In addition to the perennial problems of dysfunctional institutions, inadequate resources, and

ephemeral political will, the [UN] has always faced crises of expectations.”(Chesterman 2006, 59)

Ten years after the signature of the Charter, the UN membership was expanded from 50 to 76 countries. The

process of decolonization, after World War II, was responsible for the incredible emergence of new countries

and actors at the international scene. (Weiss, 2009, 271) By that time, the number of seats at the Council

already represented only 14% of the membership. Among the 26 new members recognized during this period,

50% were Asian nations and represented 30% of the entire General Assembly by then. After this great


increase in the number of Asian nations, African nations also started to be largely accepted as member states.

In 5 years – from 1955 until 1960 – 21 African countries became members of UN; at this point the continent

represented 25% of General Assembly. By 1960, Asia and Africa represented more than 50% of the entire UN

membership, but yet its representation inside the Security Council was null. In 1963, the UN membership had

risen to 113 states, yet only 9% of its entire membership were represented inside the Council.

Therefore, by analyzing a timeline of facts and the initial structure of the organization, it is possible to say

that UN members were pushed to start, since the inception of the organization for, an active role in

transforming the representation inside the Security Council. Already in 1955, sixteen Latin American

countries and Spain presented a fi rst proposal of expansion to the Council’s seats. (UN Yearbook 1956, 147-

149) Nevertheless, only after the creation of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), the proposal and

promulgation of a fi rst actual pattern of seats’ distribution occurred and an only expansion of Council’s seats

from 11 to 15 – together with an amendment of the Charter – was implemented in 1965. (See document A/

RES/1991(XVIII) A, 1963) The expansion of non-permanent members – from 6 to 10 seats – improved the

importance of these countries in terms of voting power inside the Council, meaning a real establishment of

more representation by that time. (Bourantonis, 2005, 28-29)

However, questions concerning the improvement of representation inside the Council did not leave the main

stage of considerations as the UN membership did not stop its large scale expansion until the end of the ‘90s.

Even though the Cold War period represented the achievement of an expansion of seats in the Council,

answering initial claims of representation, this was the only advance possible inside a paralyzed organization.

The reform in 1965 raised the representation of the entire UN membership in the Council to almost 13% at

that time, but by the end of the following twenty fi ve years it would be back to the slight representation of 9%.

Unlike the stagnation observed during the Cold War period, the ‘90s symbolized a crescent demand of

actions by the Council. Suddenly, after forty-five years, the Security Council assumed officially its

responsibility to maintain international peace and security. After the fall of the Berlin Wall and the consequent

end of USSR, the political scene suffered a great change. (Freiesleben, 2008, 2; Smith, 1999, 173) The Soviet

block was solved, many countries became independent and the UN received a new batch of members. As

expected, the 159 members of 1990 became 185 by 1994, feeding even more claims of representation inside a

Council that, by then, started to represent only 8% of the organization as a whole.

The last decade of the XX century presented a great quantity of turning points to reform discussions on the

Security Council. This decade represented the fi rst offi cial step towards a desire to demonstrate some kind of

will to reform the Council. The year of 1979 marked the successful attempt from NAM members to include at

the General Assembly’s agenda the question of reforming the Security Council (See UN Yearbook 1979, 436),

but only with the approval of Resolution A/47/RES.62, in 1992, equitable representation inside the Security

Council became an official topic of the General Assembly’s agenda – the “Question of equitable


representation on and increase in the membership of the Security Council.” Following the creation of this

topic and its debates, an Open-ended Working Group on matters of reform was created in 1993, aiming to

conduct member states to an agreement on how to reform the Council. (See UN Yearbook 1992, 140; UN

Yearbook 1993, 212)

3 – The debates on a question of equitable representation

Between the years of 1993 and 1999, meetings on the topic “Question of equitable representation on and

increase in the membership of the Security Council” were a fertile ground for proposals, opinions and

decisions on how the process of reform should be conducted. Countries and groups presented its positions on

a fair method to transform the Council. Every year, in the General Assembly’s hall, all interested members

stated their points of view, solid principles as well as change of opinion.

In 1993, the question of equitable representation become item in the agenda of the General Assembly. Italy

and Turkey, during the debates, proposed establishing a new category of elected seats, with the possibility of

reelection, following the regional decision on matters of representation. Also, in the beginning of the same

year, the US and the UK presented offi cial support to the bid of Japan and Germany, while Chile and Egypt

proposed the creation of regional seats. During the following year, 1994, France also presented support to

Japan and Germany, and, for the first time, the African group presented its claims for a continent’s fair

representation inside the Council. the group defended that Africa should receive permanent seats stipulated by

regional parameters.

Years later, members saw the celebration of UN’s 50th anniversary, in 1995, as a good opportunity to

accomplish the reform, which represented some intensive activities on these issues. In February, the NAM

formed its platform to reform the Security Council. The Nordic countries – Denmark, Finland, Iceland,

Norway and Sweden – presented a proposal to create permanent seats for Germany and Japan, and also 3

more non-permanent seats. Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Ireland and Slovenia

proposed the creation of 2 permanent seats for the industrialized countries and 2 or 5 more non-permanent

seats. Turkey proposed the enlargement of the Council with 10 more elected seats; while Mexico presented

the option to add 5 non-permanent seats and a rotational one for Japan and Germany.

In 1996, Spain presented a proposal along with the document presented by Lebanon, Sri Lanka, Libya,

Botswana, Colombia, Mexico, Argentina and Pakistan, with the objective of enlarging the non-permanent

seats at the Council based of the argument that it would lead to the democratization of the organ.

In March 1997, after 4 years of deliberations, the President of the General Assembly at the time, Ambassador

Ismael Razali presented a plan to push the negotiations forward and encourage some member states to assume

decisive positions on reform matters. According to the schedule organized by the Malaysian ambassador, the


so-called “Razali Plan,” initially the General Assembly would vote the expansion of the Security Council in 5

new permanent members and 4 elected seats; in a second stage, the Assembly would approve another

resolution specifying the candidates to fi ll the new seats; and, one week later the members would vote the two

previous resolutions to be added as amendments to the Charter. (See the Report of the Open-Ended Working

Group, 1997, 5-9)

The plan from Ambassador Razali raised divergent reactions. While a group of countries – like Brazil, Japan

and Germany – accepted the proposal as an important factor to construct a perfect momentum for reform,

other members – like Pakistan, Indonesia, Argentina and Mexico –, representing the position of NAM,

declared that it was a very authoritarian proposition. Japan and Germany understood the plan as an

opportunity to fi nally obtain their desired permanent seats and strongly supported Razali’s proposal. Other

regionally prominent countries as such Brazil and India also viewed the proposition as an opportunity to

achieve higher positions inside the organization. On the other hand, the majority of NAM members saw this

model of reform as a quick-fix, that could cause relevant harm to its unity and its consequent power as

majority.

In a controversial decade of endless discussions on the reform aspects, Razali Plan ignited the debates. After

the presentation of this plan and the positioning by NAM, members started to focus their negotiations and

statements in establishing a ways to approve or destroy Razali’s schedule as soon as possible. The

presentation of this plan was considered by some delegations as a fi rst great momentum for the Council’s

reform.

NAM held two ministerial meetings to discuss Razali’s propositions in 1997 and stated that its 113 members

would not be in favor of any formula that would increase discrimination between member states and keep the

Council unable to represent the majority of the UN members. (See the statement by Egypt at the document

A/52/PV.63, 1997, 4-7) With the discussion polarized by opinions on the plan (Smith, 1999, 187), Italy

created the group called Coffee Club aiming to join like-minded countries, mostly from NAM, and discuss

reform possibilities. The Coffee Club assumed the NAM position and started to defend it as a coalition inside

the reform debates.

The NAM ministerial meetings occurred in April and September of that year and, while the permanents UK,

France and US affi rmed their positions of support an expansion limited to a total number of 21 members, the

Coffee Club presented its fi rst offi cial proposal as a group. The group gathered 32 supporters to ask for the

establishment of Article number 108 as rule for any decision related to the reform, in 22 October 1997. (See

document A/52/L.7, 1997) This draft generated an immediate reaction, especially by Japan and Germany,

pointing the action as a tactic to delay the reform process and destroy the momentum achieved. (Drifte, 2000,

184-185)

The polemical draft was discussed for one year and received some adjusts according to what would be more


favorable to achieve consensus among members. In 1998, Belgium led a group that also presented a draft

resolution and, at the same time, accused the Coffee Club initiative as obstructionist. (See the statement by

Belgium at document A/53/PV.64, 1998, 28-29; See document A/53/L.42, 1998) Attending to negotiations, the

Coffee Club presented a second draft that lately received around 80 sponsors and expanded signifi cantly its

base of support. (See documents A/53/L.16 and A/53/L.16.Rev.1, 1998) Therefore, the document presented by

the Belgium group proved to be irrelevant when the agreement was achieved and the proposal by Coffee Club

was adopted as the Resolution 53/30 in 23 November 1998. Hopes of a near reform were suppressed with the

approval of the idea that any kind of reform, possibly adopted in the future, would only be accepted with the

approval by two-thirds of the entire UN membership. (See document A/53/30, 1998)

The last decade of the XX century, despite its intense activity and strong positioning, ended as it started,

extending to the new century the same old discussions and the same old disagreement among members’

positions. The year 2000 represented a lot for the UN membership; especially because of the Millennium

Summit, held in September of that year. With the end of the millennium, the waiting for reform became more

uncomfortable for the delegations that started a strong exchange of accusations during the opened debates.

The Millennium Summit was supposed to be a main event of transformation for the UN and represented a

second hope for a momentum on the reform matters. It called member states to assume a fi rm engagement

with the organization’s principles and also with the necessity of transform it into a more global arena of

negotiation. All members realized the favorable moment for a reform and assumed more aggressive positions

during the debates, especially in discussions related to the Security Council’s reform. Notwithstanding, after

the beginning of a new debate’s round it became clear that “membership of the UN was still unable to reach

even a minimum common position.” (Bourantonis, 2005, 86)

After 11 September 2001 terrorist attack to the World Trade Center, the focus on reforming the Council

shifted to a stronger approach to working methods. The following years represented a new challenge to the

Security Council, in terms of action. The so-called “Global War on Terrorism” assumed a central position for

the membership while the debates on enlargement became secondary topic.

Nevertheless, a great crisis of legitimacy started inside the United Nations in March 2003, after the

unapproved invasion of Iraq in March. The US decided to invade the country after presenting accusations that

Iraq possibly possessed weapons of mass destruction and supposedly gave support to Al-Qaeda in

Afghanistan back then. The action against the Iraqi government was vetoed by some of the permanent seats,

such as France, due to lack of evidences in the accusations presented by US representatives. Even with the

negative answer by the Council, the US army invaded the territory and started a confl ict that lasted for nine

years. This unfortunate event brought back to the table the extreme necessity of regain legitimacy for the

Council in the international arena.

The Secretary General Kofi Annan presented, then, a proposal of create a High Level Panel on Threats,


Challenges and Change as an attempt to motivate members to engage in a real effort to reform the

organization. After the failure and crisis related to the Iraq War, Annan declared that if the members wanted

“the Council’s decisions to command great respect, particularly in the developing world, [they would] need to

address the issue of its composition with greater urgency.” (See the Secretary General statement at A/58/PV.7,

2003) Thus, the Secretary General assumed a clear position of push member states for results on reform.

The panel created by Kofi Annan presented the report A More Secure World: A Shared Responsibility in

December of 2004 that contained two options of reform models for the Council, in an updated version of

Razali’s former proposition. The fi rst model (Model A) proposed the enlargement to 24 seats, including 6 new

permanent and 3 elected members. Model number 2 (Model B) presented the option of create 1 new standard

elected seats and 8 seats of a new category, renewable every 4 years instead of 2.

Kofi Annan presented his report entitled In a larger freedom: towards development, security and human

rights for all to support the panel’s document in March 2005. As the presentation of the Razali’s Plan in 1997,

the report and its consequences represented another great hope of momentum for the reform process in 2005.

(Schrijver, 2007, 134) Members were encouraged by the SG to make a decision quickly on the models

proposed and reach a consensus by the 2005 World Summit. Thus, the delegations started to present their

positions in favor or against each of the models placed on the table by the panel and also present their own

new proposals of reform style, following Annan’s request.

Three main coalitions assumed an important position inside the discussions of expand the number of seats

inside the Security Council, answering the Secretary General’s request for more efforts towards the reform:

The African Union (AU); the Group of Four (G4); and, the Uniting for Consensus (UfC). The G4 was

presented offi cially as a group during the opened debates on the question of equitable representation of 2004,

by the Brazilian mission (See document A/59/PV.25, 2004). In February 2005, the UfC document was

presented by the former Coffee Club’s members, assuming officially the new name and format of the

coalition. The AU, though, was already an existent regional group since the ‘60s.

In 6 July 2005, the Group of Four presented its resolution draft for the reform, followed by the African

Union, in 18 July, and Uniting for Consensus, in 22 July. (See documents A/59/L.64, A/59/L.67 and A/59/

L.68, 2005) Later on that year, in 10 November 2005, the Small Five (S5) also presented its proposal, focused

on the working methods of the Council.

The year of 2006 also marked a very important period to the reform discussions with the decision to

implement intergovernmental negotiations as a new procedure of decision-making on the matters of

expanding the Council. Thereby, the negotiations were offi cially approved in 15 September 2008 and started

in February 2009, representing another impression of momentum for the reform by that time.

After the fi rst round of negotiations, in 2009, the representatives of Italy and Colombia, core members of the

UfC, presented a new draft resolution, adapting the one distributed in 2005. The new proposal added one of


the first ideas of Italy and Turkey inside the reform official debates, back in 1993, calling for the

establishment of reelections as a possibility for non-permanent members, according to regional choices; as a

kind of semi-permanent membership.

The second half of the decade did not represent much of an advance for expansion matters, after the intense

activity during the fi rst half. With the intergovernmental negotiations, the platform of debate changed but the

deadlock remained. The first Rome Ministerial Meeting was held in May 2009, organized by the UfC

members, as an attempt to gather support and consequent results for the reform process. The meeting gathered

120 states aiming to debate the reform issue and to present the intentions of that group.

Following this meeting and its developments, a new group was created and presented its own proposal in 6

September 2011. African, Latin American and Caribbean countries created the so-called L.69 group and its

proposal was a mixture of G4 and AU objectives. The group, as the other three main ad hoc coalitions

competing to establish an expansion, did not receive enough support to have its proposal approved by the

General Assembly.

The Rome Ministerial Meetings organized by the UfC were kept during the following years, happening in

February 2012 and March 2013. At the same time, the official debates on the question of equitable

representation on the Security Council were also maintained. However, the debates on the reform never

achieved an actual agreement on which model should be adopted to a possible expansion of the Security

Council, even after so many years of offi cial and unoffi cial efforts.

4 – Measuring support for reform proposals

Some agreements and disagreements were solidly established among the members during the debates. While

some general topics received complete support by the entire General Assembly, the more specific ones

initiated a complex quarrel. All members accepted that the Council should represent the entire membership

equally, in an effective and transparent way. Especially after the Cold War, a “[m]eaningful reform of the UN

to respond to this new environment and the challenges it brings requires balancing questions of legitimacy,

effectiveness, and power.” (Chesterman, 2006, 63) However, even agreeing to create a more equal

representation in numerical and geographical aspects, the presented models never became common sense.

Therefore, a system of numerical measuring was used in this paper to establish the analysis of how much

support each idea and topic over the expansion received during the debates. The system helped in the

elaboration of a visual map displaying the topics addressed during discussions and showed clearly how

possible was the real occurrence of a reform during 20 years (1993-2012). The basic material of analysis used

in this research was the set of statements conceded at the UN General Assembly’s Hall, during the open

debates on the agenda item “Question of equitable representation on and increase in the membership of the


Security Council.” During these debates, countries presented, individually or on behalf of regional groups,

their opinions on the issue of reform the Council.

It is important to note that the best source of support that should be used in a case related to the UN would

obviously be voting results and the positions presented by countries during the debates could be different from

a fi nal vote. However, with exception to the Resolution A/RES/53/30, the reform ideas never received enough

support to be taken into consideration on a voting process. This, consequently, led researches like this paper,

to establish only informal levels of support, based on the existing registers. The so-called verbatim records of

the meetings (PV) are, in this case, the only offi cial sources for a possible measuring of how the expansion

ideas were addressed by the UN membership.

Then, this paper considered, during the measuring of these unoffi cial levels, the number of mentions to

specifi c topics by the member states and established the calculation of averages of these mentions by year. The

averages of mentions were the base of a comparison with the percentage necessary to an approval in the

General Assembly – around 66% –; generating speculations on which topic could be approved if submitted to

a voting process.

Generally speaking on a possible enlargement of the Council’s membership and on the potential points of

momentum reached during this process, four main topics must be considered: First, the support to an

expansion of the existing categories of seats; second, the support to specifi c candidates for new permanent

seats; third, the question of the veto; and, fi nally, the support received by the 3 main proposals of expansion

presented by AU, G4 and UfC.

The issue of expansion of the Security Council, during the debates, assumed a very important position. Most

of the references to expansion included specifi cations of the missions’ preferences on an enlargement in both

existent categories – permanent and non-permanent seats – or just in one of them – the non-permanent.

Thereby, analyzing the numbers collected from the offi cial registers of debates, the restrict support to an

expansion only in the non-permanent category assumed a very low percentage of positive mentions, while the

expansion in both categories reached the majority of support during the 20 years of discussions. The absolute

majority considered in comparison to the level requested in a voting inside the General Assembly (66%) was

reached only once by the enlargement in permanent and non-permanent seats in 2005, with 72% of positive

positions by the participants. On the other hand, the open support to an expansion exclusively on elected seats,

during the debates, had its higher percentage in 2001, when it reached merely 22% of participants’ positive

positions. (See Chart I)


The fi rst expansion of the Council in 1965 happened only in the non-permanent category of seats, but an

agreement on expanding the Council in both categories was obviously achieved by the delegations from the

‘90s. Over the years, an expansion similar to the one realized during the ‘60s received the support from only a

minority of UN member states.

Nevertheless, the problem of the majority achieved on the matters of expand the existent categories of the

Council was the lack of specifi city on this decision. Regardless of the high and clear support to an expansion

in both existent categories, the same cannot be said about the methods to directly specify which countries

should be understood as capable to assume the responsibilities of permanence.

Some countries clearly presented the wish to become permanent members inside the Security Council.

Notwithstanding, even with the direct support received by Japan and Germany from 3 of the 5 permanent

members – France, the UK and the US –, no country actually received enough support for their bids.

Mentions to countries were basically reduced to 6 actors: Japan, Germany, Brazil, India, Indonesia and South

Africa. While the members of G4 – Japan, Brazil, Germany and India – received comparatively more support,

Indonesia and South Africa received just one mention each, that did not mean any representative result in the

complete context.

The apex of specifi c support for the G4 members occurred in 2004 and 2005, with the presentation of the

draft resolutions for reform. At that moment, the percentages of support reached were 24% for Japan, 19% for

Germany, 12% for Brazil and 16% for India. However, compared to the percentage of majority considered for

decisions in the General Assembly, none of the actors that actually received direct mentions from UN

members reached the necessary level of support for a possible election as new permanent member; not even at

the moments considered by delegations as points of momentum of the reform process.

0

15

30

45

60

75

Both categories 27.6 37.3 32.4 50 52.8 36.5 56 60.9 44.8 41.6 40.8 54.8 72.5 45.3 44.8 40.7 41.9 33.8 53.4 40.4

Just non-permanent 5.2 16.9 18.9 8.8 15.7 12.7 11.9 10.9 22.4 13.5 20.4 10.3 6.6 9.3 9.2 10.2 10.8 14.7 15.5 14.9

1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

66

Chart I: Percentage of supportive mentions to an expansion of existent categories (1993-2012)


It is also important to consider in this analysis the possible agreement on the question of the veto that

defi nitively assumed an infl uence on results of the 20 years of debates. Before the beginning of the offi cial

debates on the reform of the Council, the power to block decisions held by the permanent seats was widely

criticized by the general UN membership as a privilege that was against the principle of sovereign equality of

states fi xed at the UN Charter. During the fi rst years of discussions, the veto remained a rejected practice for

most of the members that demonstrated in diverse ways their positions, calling for a simple constraint of

power while the absolute abolishment of the veto was not possible. The obvious exception to this rejection

were the 5 permanent members; US, UK, France, Russia and China.

The repudiation of veto dominated the debates completely during most of the years, but the positive positions

on a possible expansion of the power gained strength from 1997. During that year, the African position

assumed the claim of equality between the possible new permanent seats and the current ones, implementing a

new variable of complexity to the analysis; at the same time that the African members were against the veto,

they started to affi rm that an expansion of the power would be reasonable in terms of equality of member

states. Even though, the talks against the veto dominated the debates and reached a considerable majority in

2001, with 64%. (See Chart II)

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

V 1.7 6.8 6.8 4.4 14.3 17.5 27.4 15.5 17.9 10.1 2 7.9 11 9.3 10.3 3.4 16.2 11.8 17.2 14.9

NV 25.9 30.5 44.6 41.2 30 30.2 48.8 39.1 64.2 39.2 42.9 24.6 22 26.7 18.4 13.6 23 17.6 24.1 17

1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

66

Chart II: Percentages of mentions for (V) and against (NV) the veto power (1993-2012)

However, an agreement on reforming or not the veto was never possible due to the affi rmations that no

reform in that power would be accepted by the current permanents. Any attempt of decisions over the power

of the permanent members would have been defi nitely blocked by the 5 permanents, independently of how

agreed it could be among the general membership or how a real momentum could be possibly achieved by the

discussions.

Bringing this analysis to an even more specifi c level, it is also possible to observe the levels of support to the


main proposals of expansion presented during the 59th session of the General Assembly and its groups. The

years of 2004 and 2005 represented the mostly active years in terms of membership participation during the

debates and were also considered a momentum for the reform of the Council.

As a regional group before the presentation of the draft, the African Union already had a high number of

mentions during the early years of debates. The so-called African position was presented since the beginning

of the discussions, in 1993, and received positive feedbacks since that time. When the draft resolution

presented the ideas of the Ezulwini Consensus in 2005, bringing the entire continent together as a strong

group to the debate, it only repeated more concretely the claims presented in the reports of the Organization of

African Unity during the ‘90s. The proposal just brought more offi cial aspects to a position already defended

strictly since the beginning of the offi cial discussions, but reached a maximum support of only 20.7% in 2011.

(See Chart III)

0

5

10

15

20

25

UfC 4.8 5.5 5.3 5.7 5.1 4.1 11.8 8.6 19.1

G4 18.3 18.7 16 5.7 1.7 1.4 5.9 8.6 10.6

AU 17.5 15.4 14.7 19.5 6.8 18.9 19.1 20.7 17

2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Chart III: Levels of support received by UfC, G4 and AU proposals (2004-2012)

Differently, even with the previous existence of the Coffee Club, UfC and G4 just started to have positive

mentions from the presentation of their proposals to the General Assembly. Despite their late arrival to the bid,

considering the necessary majority of 66% to a possible approval in a voting, the two groups were also not

able to achieve high percentages, as the maximums reached were: 19% for the UfC, in 2012; and 18.7% for

the G4, in 2005. (See Chart III) Initially, the G4 received a strong support during the debates, being similar to

the support received by the AU, but the number fell over the years. On the other hand, the UfC started with

low positive feedbacks from the delegations and was able to acquire more mentions by 2012.

The main point that must be highlighted over the support received by the three proposals of enlargement

presented by UfC, G4 and AU is the fact that their presentations happened in a moment of intense reform

activities and in years that the UN membership was deeply engaged in pushing forward a transformation of

the Security Council. Even with this intense round of debates and the presentation of more specifi c ideas on


how to reform the Council, a real agreement on the model was never achieved. Thereby, even with the

impression of a great momentum for the process by that time, this momentum never truly happened.

5 – Conclusion

It was possible to trace a map of the positioning by missions during the last 20 years of offi cial discussions

on the reform matters analyzing the speeches and positions on the “Question of equitable representation on

and increase in the membership of the Security Council and related matters.” Some conclusions became very

clear after the combination of the results of a basic numerical system with a chronological organization of

facts; comparatively measuring the levels of support given by UN members to specifi c topics on the reform of

the Council.

In summary, the lack of majority observed in a throughout evaluation of the 20 years of debates on reforming

the Security Council was very different from the impressions carried by the delegations and point to a very

signifi cant consideration. The reform of the Security Council probably never had a real momentum, because a

real agreement among member states was never achieved in a way that could make an enlargement possible.

Therefore, the majority of 66% requested by the General Assembly for a possible voting approval was never

reached on specifi c topics of the reform, even considering the events and moments understood as great points

of momentum for the reform process – the Razali Plan, the Millennium Summit, the years of 2004-2005 and

the Intergovernmental Negotiations.

The expectation on the fi rst real proposal of structure for a reform presented by Razali in 1997, for example,

made the missions understand the step as a great momentum, when it did not occur actually; the numbers

resulted from mentions inside the debates did not indicate any proximity towards resolutions by that time.

Another example of a momentum not reached was the presentation of proposals by AU, G4 and UfC to the

general membership, when an agreement in support one of the draft resolutions was also unable to be

established; none of the coalitions could reach a level of support higher than 23% and their drafts were not

even considered for voting attempts.

The multiplicity of positions, according to some diplomats inside UN, took the organization to the “infi nite

debate” on establish a more representation inside the Security Council. Multilateralism is one of the strongest

characteristics of UN. Moreover, as an organization aiming to defend interests that are common between all

nations in the world, every recognized country has the right to expose its views on international issues.

However, many important questions regarding the transformation of the Council remain unsolved after twenty

years of discussions because a common position was never discovered on these matters and the real

momentum of the Security Council reform never came.


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The Momentum That Never Came: A Chronology of UN Security Council Debates, 1993-2012

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